kirkydu (86.35)

Freedom from Stagflation

10

I would just like to wish everybody a happy and safe Independence Day before I jump into this month's letter. Regardless of how bad some things sound, I remember that the people of the United States have created one of the world's great civilizations in a very short time. No ten to twenty year period should destroy the gifts of our geography, the cumulative depth of our visions and the consistent hard work of a nation. America can overcome any theft or any bastardization of American ideals if we just use common sense to trump ideological dogma.

I would like to propose a "fair tax code". Just simplify the tax code. Get rid of all these deductions and credits. If you want one particular group to pay less taxes, just lower their rate, period. For instance, if you want small businesses to pay a lower rate, just lower the tax rate for the schedule C. Period. You can't say it can't be done because they did it for the schedule D. There's no need for the tax code to be as convoluted as it is. But thats just my opinion.

More specifically, the proposals by the President to get rid of a pile of special interest tax breaks make a ton of sense. I'd also limit how much in cap gains from secondary markets can be taken at the cap gains rate, say a million a year, everything above that is income taxed. It makes no sense people making millions are paying teen tax rates. The tax break for hedge fund managers is criminal, that needs to go yesterday.

And one further point, I dont believe that simplifying that tax code will cause all CPAs to lose their jobs. As a CPA, I actually make some of my money from tax preparation. But what simplifying the tax code will do is reduce the amount of time I have to spendng finding out what the newest and hottest deduction is so I can spend more time doing actual accounting (go figure). It will cause many of these cracker jack big box tax shops to go out of business. But considering how they prey on the little guy, some of them should go out of business. But thats just my opinion anyway.